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. 2023 Apr 3;77(3):351-354.
doi: 10.1093/cid/ciad197. Online ahead of print.

Increases in group A streptococcal infections in the pediatric population in Houston, TX, 2022

Aya Aboulhosn  1 , Misu A Sanson  1 , Luis Alberto Vega  1 , Maria G Segura  1 , Lauren M Summer  2 , Marritta Joseph  2 , J Chase McNeil  2 , Anthony R Flores  1
Affiliations

Increases in group A streptococcal infections in the pediatric population in Houston, TX, 2022

Aya Aboulhosn et al. Clin Infect Dis. .

Abstract

Beginning in October 2022, we observed a substantial increase in the total number of cases of invasive GAS disease (iGAS) in the pediatric population in Houston, TX. Emm12 GAS strains were disproportionately represented but the overall proportion of iGAS infections observed during the current spike was similar to pre-pandemic years.

Keywords: emm type; Group A Streptococcus; children; invasive; outbreak.

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Conflict of interest statement

Potential conflicts of interest. J. C. M. reports grants or contracts from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (R01HS026896, principal investigator), the Lefamulin trial (Nabriva Therapeutics, site principal investigator), and Allergan (investigator-initiated research), all unrelated to the present work; royalties for writing of chapters for UpToDate and Springer Nature. All other authors report no potential conflicts.

All authors have submitted the ICMJE Form for Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest. Conflicts that the editors consider relevant to the content of the manuscript have been disclosed.

Figures

Graphical Abstract
Graphical Abstract
This graphical abstract is also available at Tidbit: https://tidbitapp.io/tidbits/increases-in-group-a-streptococcal-infections-in-the-pediatric-population-in-houston-tx-2022-d4061766-9dc7-4850-80e5-792060811999
Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Comparison of pediatric group A streptococcal (GAS) infections in prepandemic and pandemic periods. A, Total pediatric GAS cases by 3-month period (quarter) in prepandemic (2014–2018) and pandemic (2022) years. Vertical bars represent total cases for the given year with red insets indicating total invasive GAS cases. Percentages for invasive GAS in the 2014–2018 period by quarter are given along with percentage of invasive GAS cases in 2022. B, Frequency of GAS emm types among invasive pediatric infections for prepandemic (2014–2018) and pandemic (2022) years. Only those emm types with >10 observations (combined) are shown. P value was determined by χ2 test following Bonferroni correction. Complete emm type data are provided in Supplementary Table 2.
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